Elegies on the Death of Cowley (1667)

ON Mr. ABRAHAM COWLEY HIS DEATH AND BURIAL AMONGST THE
ANCIENT POETS.
By the Honourable Sir John Denham.

OLd Chaucer, like the morning Star,
To us discovers day from far,
His light those Mists and Clouds dissolv'd,
Which our dark Nation long involv'd;
But he descending to the shades,
Darkness again the Age invades.
Next (like Aurora) Spencer rose,
Whose purple blush the day foreshews;
The other three, with his own fires, Phoebus, the Poets God, inspires; 10
By Shakespear, Johnson, Fletcher's lines,
Our Stages lustre Rome's outshines:
These Poets neer our Princes sleep,
And in one Grave their Mansion keep;
They liv'd to see so many days,
Till time had blasted all their Bays:
But cursed be the fatal hour
That pluckt the fairest, sweetest flower
That in the Muses Garden grew,
And amongst wither'd Lawrels threw. 20
Time, which made them their Fame outlive,
To Cowly scarce did ripeness give.
Old Mother Wit, and Nature gave Shakespear and Fletcher all they have;
In Spencer, and in Johnson, Art,
Of slower Nature got the start;
But both in him so equal are,
None knows which bears the happy'st share;
To him no Author was unknown,
Yet what he wrote was all his own; 30
He melted not the ancient Gold,
Nor with Ben Johnson did make bold
To plunder all the Roman stores
Of Poets, and of Orators: Horace his wit, and Virgil's state,
He did not steal, but emulate,
And when he would like them appear,
Their Garb, but not their Cloaths, did wear:
He not from Rome alone, but Greece,
Like Jason brought the Golden Fleece; 40
To him that Language (though to none
Of th' others) as his own was known.
On a stiff gale (as Flaccus sings) [His pindarics.
The Theban Swan extends his wings,
When through th'ætherial Clouds he flies,
To the same pitch our Swan doth rise;
Old Pindar's flights by him are reacht,
When on that gale his wings are stretcht;
His fancy and his judgment such,
Each in the other seem'd too much, 50
His severe judgment (giving Law)
His modest fancy kept in awe:
As rigid Husbands jealous are,
When they believe their Wives too fair,
His English stream so pure did flow,
As all that saw, and tasted, know.
But for his Latin vein, so clear,
Strong, full, and high it doth appear, [His last work.
That were immortal Virgil here,
Him, for his judge, he would not fear; 60
Of that great Portraicture, so true
A Copy Pencil never drew.
My Muse her Song had ended here,
But both their Genii strait appear,
Joy and amazement her did strike,
Two Twins she never saw so like;*
Such a resemblance of all parts,
Life, Death, Age, Fortune, Nature, Arts,
Then lights her Torch at theirs, to tell,
And shew the world this Parallel, 70
Fixt and contemplative their looks,
Still turning over Natures Books:
Their works chast, moral, and divine,
Where profit and delight combine;
They guilding dirt, in noble verse
Rustick Philosophy rehearse;**
Nor did their actions fall behind
Their words, but with like candour shin'd,***
Both by two generous Princes lov'd,
Who knew, and judg'd what they approv'd 80
Yet having each the same desire,
Both from the busie throng retire;
Their Bodies to their Minds resign'd,
Car'd not to propagate their Kind: Yet though both fell before their hour,
Time on their off-spring hath no power,
Nor fire, nor fate their Bays shall blast,
Nor Death's dark vail their day o'recast.

SEVERAL COPIES OF
VERSES
ON THE DEATH OF
Mr. ABRAHAM COWLEY
And his Burial in
WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

OUR wit, till Cowley did its lustre raise,
May be resembled to the first three daies,
In which did shine only such streaks of light
As serv'd but to distinguish Day from Night:
But wit breaks forth, in all that he has done,
Like Light when 'twas united in the Sun.
The Poets formerly did lye in wait
To rifle those whom they would imitate:
We Watcht to rob all strangers when they writ
And Learnt their Language but to steal their Wit. 10
He from that need his Country does redeem,
Since those who want may be supply'd from him;
And Forreign Nations now may borrow more
From Cowley than we could from them before;
Who though he condescended to admit
The Greeks and Romans for his Guides in wit
Yet he those ancient Poets does pursue
But as the Spaniards great Columbus do;
He taught them first to the New World to steer,
But they possess all that is precious there. 20
When first his spring of wit began to flow,
It rais'd in some, wonder and sorrow too,
That God had so much wit and knowledge lent,
And that they were not in his praises spent.
But those who in his Davideis look,
Find they his Blossoms for his Fruit mistook:
In diff'ring Ages diff'rent Muses shin'd,
His Green did charm the Sense, his Ripe the Mind.
Writing for Heaven he was inspir'd from thence,
And from his Theam deriv'd his influence. 30
The Scripture will no more the wicked fright;
His Muse does make Religion a delight.
Oh how severely Man is us'd by Fate!
The covetous toil long for an Estate;
And having got more than their life can spend,
They may bequeath it to a Son or Friend:
But Learning (in which none can have a share,
Unless they climb to it by time and care,
Learning, the truest wealth which man can have)
Does with his Body, perish in his Grave: 40
To Tenements of Clay it is confin'd,
Though 'tis the noblest purchase of the mind:
Oh why can we thus leave our friends possest
Of all our acquisitions but the best?
Still when we study Cowley we lament
That to the world he was no longer lent;
Who, like a lightning, to our eyes was shown;
So bright he shin'd and was so quickly gone.
Sure he rejoic'd to see his flame expire,
Since he himself could not have rais'd it higher; 50
For when wise Poets can no higher flie,
They would, like Saints, in their perfection die.
Though beauty some affection in him bred,
Yet only sacred learning would he wed;
By which th'illustrious off-spring of his brain
Shall over Wits great Empire ever reign:
His works shall live, when Pyramids of Pride
Shrink to such ashes as they long did hide.
That sacrilegious fire (which did last year
Level those Piles which Piety did rear) 60
Dreaded neer that majestick Church to flye
Where English Kings and English Poets lye:
It at an awful distance did expire,
Such pow'r had sacred Ashes over fire;
Such as it durst not neer that Structure come
Which Fate had order'd to be Cowley's Tomb;
And 'twill be still preserv'd, by being so,
From what the rage of future Flames can do.
Material Fire dares not that place infest
Where he who had immortal flame does rest. 70
There let his Urn remain, for it was fit
Amongst our Kings to lay the King of wit:
By which the Structure more renown'd will prove
For that part bury'd than for all above.

Orrey's elegy absorbs much of his earlier tribute to Cowley's Davideis; see excerpts in Loiseau, 4-5.

ODE
Upon the Death of
Mr. COWLEY

1.

HE who would worthily adorn his Herse,
Should write in his own way, in his immortal Verse:
But who can such majestick Numbers write?
With such inimitable light?
His high and noble flights to reach
'Tis not the art of Precept that can teach.
The world's grown old since Pindar, and to breed
Another such did twenty ages need.

2.

At last another Pindar came,
Great as the first in Genius and in Fame; 10
But that the first in Greek, a conquering Language, sung
And the last wrote but in an Island Tongue.
Wit, thought, invention in them both do flow
As Torrents tumbling from the mountains go.
Though the great Roman Lyrick do maintain
That none can equal Pindar's strain;Cowley with words as full and thoughts as high
As ever Pindar did, does flie;
Of Kings and Heros he as boldly sings,
And flies above the Clouds, yet never wets his wings. 20

3.

As fire aspiring, as the Sea profound,
Nothing in Nature can his fancy bound;
As swift as Lightning in its course,
And as resistless in his force.
Whilst other Poets, like Bees who range the field
To gather what the Flowers will yield,
Glean matter with much toil and pain
To bring forth Verses in an humble strain;
He sees about him round,
Possest at once of all that can be found: 30
To his illuminated eye
All things created open lye,
That all his thoughts so clear and so perspicuous be,
That whatsoever he describes we see;
Our Souls are with his passions fir'd,
And he who does but read him is inspir'd.

4.

Pindar to Thebes, where first he drew his breath,
Though for his sake his race was sav'd from death
By th' Macedonian Youth, did not more honour do
Than Cowley does his Friends and Country too. 40
Had Horace liv'd his wit to understand,
He ne're had England thought a rude inhospitable Land;Rome might have blush'd, and Athens been asham'd
To hear a remote Britain nam'd,
Who for his parts does match, if not exceed,
The greatest men that they did either breed.

5.

If he had flourish'd when Augustus sway'd,
Whose peaceful Scepter the whole world obey'd,
Account of him Mecenas would have made;
And from the Country shade, 50
Him into th' Cabinet have tane
To divert Cesar's cares and charm his pain:
For nothing can such Balm infuse
Into a wearied mind as does a noble Muse.

6.

It is not now as 'twas in former days,
When all the Streets of Rome were strow'd with Bays
To receive Petrarch, who through Arches rode,
Triumphal Arches, honour'd as a Demy-God;
Not for Towns conquer'd, or for Batels won,
But for Victories which were more his own, 60
For Victories of Wit, and Victories of Art,
In which blind undiscerning Fortune had no part.

7.

Though Cowley ne're such honours did attain,
As long as Petrarch's, Cowley's name shall reign;
'Tis but his dross that's in the Grave,
His memory Fame from Death shall save;
His Bayes shall flourish, and be ever green,
When those of Conquerors are not to be seen.

Nec tibi mors ipsa superstes erit.

Thomas Higgons.

FINIS.London, printed for H. Herringman, at the Blew Anchor in the
Lower-walk of the New Exchange. 1667.[Folger copy]